Garden Gem available! sort of...

naseer · July 16, 2015

If you've followed any of the news about the research into tasty varieties coming out of University of Florida, you may already be familiar with the Garden Gem variety that Harry Klee developed. Produced through traditional cross-breeding techniques, it was optimized for both superb flavor and shippability, so you would think it would be poised to replace all the styrofoam-tasting tomatoes on the shelves in supermarkets worldwide. Unfortunately, the buyers at the stores and seed suppliers have responded tepidly, so the seeds aren't readily available. More details on that here:

http://www.slate.com/articles/life/f...ors_picks=true

HOWEVER, there is a silver lining. I looked on fb for Garden Gem, and found that they've set up an fb page just for this variety (https://www.facebook.com/pages/Garde...717213?fref=ts). There, they claim that if you donate to the University of Florida Tomato Research Fund--no suggested minimum--they'll send you seeds for Garden Gem and Garden Treasure (even newer variety). The link to the UF fundraising page is: https://www.uff.ufl.edu/OnlineGiving...undCode=011545

I gave $20 and thought there might be more people here who would be interested. Really looking forward to tasting this variety next summer!

naseer · July 21, 2015

More details.

It turns out Garden Gem is semi-determinate and Garden Treasure is indeterminate. I think both are F1 Hybrid. So far almost 800 people have donated (the minimum is $10), and they've already sent out 500 packs of seeds--20 seeds of each variety per donation. It's too bad that in zone 5b I won't be able to plant mine until next year. Very interested to see how they do in our region.

naseer · August 6, 2015

My seeds arrived! The demand was so high that they temporarily ran out of Garden Treasure (their indeterminate hybrid), which is too bad. However, they did provide 4 packets of 20 seeds each:

2 packets are "new hybrid" with record levels of lycopene
1 packet of Garden Gem
1 packet of one of Garden Gem's parents--Maglia Rosa Cherry

Did anyone end up getting any Garden Treasure?

maf · August 6, 2015

A few days ago I received Garden Gem and Garden Treasure, but I didn't get any new hybrids.

I am pretty sure there was another thread here talking about these seeds and this offer.

roper2008 · August 6, 2015

I received Garden Gem and "New" Hybrid tomato.

Barb_FL · August 6, 2015

Mine were delivered yesterday and it was Garden Gem and Garden Treasure.

I am going to plant for the fall season; probably within the next week or so.

What does it say about the "New Hybrid".

kayrobbins · August 6, 2015

That is strange Barb since I got my seeds 2 weeks ago and they said they were out of Garden Treasure and substituted New Hybrid. I started 10 seeds of Garden Gem and 10 of New Hybrid as soon as I got them since I plant out fall tomatoes the first week in September. The New Hybrid only had 40% germination. The Garden Gem was 100% and those are already very robust plants that I just stepped them up to 4 inch pots.

Barb_FL · August 31, 2015

Quote:

Originally Posted by kayrobbins

That is strange Barb since I got my seeds 2 weeks ago and they said they were out of Garden Treasure and substituted New Hybrid. I started 10 seeds of Garden Gem and 10 of New Hybrid as soon as I got them since I plant out fall tomatoes the first week in September. The New Hybrid only had 40% germination. The Garden Gem was 100% and those are already very robust plants that I just stepped them up to 4 inch pots.

Well not to be the bearer of bad news, but I have similar results.

Garden Gem - I only planted 2 seeds - my spring garden is usually better than fall but of those 2 - 100% and quickly

F1 - (via a trade to share Garden Treasure seeds) - I sowed 4, but having been tipped off about the low germination rates, I soaked in Foliage Pro/water first - they did sink so I thought all was well. zero germination.

Garden Treasure - also soaked in FP/water - and one germinated quickly (like Garden Gem) the other a full week later.

naseer · August 6, 2015

Anyone want to trade some Garden Treasure for any of the seeds below? These are the two varieties they sent me instead. In the letter attached, they wrote, "We are substituting a brand new hybrid that we think has fantastic potential. It is exceptionally high in lycopene. "

"New" Hybrid Tomato
Determinate - This plant is determinate, producing abundant large round deep red 6 ounce fruits. The first fruits ripen about 70-75 days after transplanting. The plants are resistant to gray leaf spot, Phytophthora Race 3 and Fusarium wilt Races 0, 1 and 2.

Maglia Rosa Cherry
This plant is semi-determinate, producing elongated 20 grams fruit. It's an early bearer with first fruits ripening 60-65 days after transplanting. Plants are resistant Fusarium wilt Races 0 and 2. This variety is one of the parents of our Garden Gem Tomato, so you get to compare them.

Barb_FL · August 7, 2015

naseer - messaging you

RJGlew · August 15, 2015

You may find the paper listed on UofFl/H.Klee's site about taste preferences an interesting read - the sampling data is pre-2012 so GG is not included in the cluster data.

Tieman DM, McIntyre L, Blandon-Ubeda A, Bies D, Odabasi A, Rodriguez G, van der Knaap E, Taylor M, Goulet C, Mageroy MH, Snyder D, Colquoun T, Moskowitz H, Sims C, Clark D, Bartoshuk L, Klee H. 2012. The chemical interactions underlying tomato flavor preferences. Current Biology 22:1-5.

http://www.hos.ufl.edu/kleeweb/paper...%20Biology.pdf

rg

kevenson · August 31, 2015

I got my garden gems 2 days ago and am anxious to give them a start next spring. If they are as good as the "hype", they should be something. I was disappointed that they ran our of the "treasures" but they sent substitute seeds-I'll give them a try. Now, if I could only get dem perch to bite.

dfollett · September 3, 2015

I donated, received and grew Garden Treasure, Garden Gem and "New Hybrid". I can't speak to germination (I always overseed and eliminate most). They were very hardy plants that stood up to foliage diseases better than most. They produced very uniform, good looking fruits - no cracking or cat-facing, which I get a lot of because of hot days and very cool nights. They had good flavor - not WOW flavor, but certainly much better than average.

The biggest difference I saw was shelf life, which is one thing I think they were after. They do not go mushy quickly after ripening. They stay firm and seem to me that they would stand up to handling and shipping reasonably well. They also seemed to have a little thicker/firmer walls than most.

It you're growing for the great flavor of fresh picked and grow enough you have fresh coming in daily, they probably aren't for you. If you are growing to have something to sell that looks good, has decent shelf life and beats the pants off the taste of most tomatoes with good shelf life and would stand up to quite a bit of handling, I think they are definitely worth trying.

naseer · September 3, 2015

Thanks, dfollett. That is a very helpful description. I grow a few hybrids with strong yield and disease resistance mainly as insurance against a bad season. But we devote most of our space for discovering WOW flavor, and will tolerate slightly worse yields (though not low yield) as the necessary compromise. Now I have to think about which of these seeds I want to grow next spring now that I have more information.

Thanks, everyone!

Fred Hempel · September 3, 2015

Does this mean that you think Garden Gem is not as flavorful as Maglia Rosa? It is being billed as roughly equivalent.

Quote:

Originally Posted by dfollett

I donated, received and grew Garden Treasure, Garden Gem and "New Hybrid". I can't speak to germination (I always overseed and eliminate most). They were very hardy plants that stood up to foliage diseases better than most. They produced very uniform, good looking fruits - no cracking or cat-facing, which I get a lot of because of hot days and very cool nights. They had good flavor - not WOW flavor, but certainly much better than average.

The biggest difference I saw was shelf life, which is one thing I think they were after. They do not go mushy quickly after ripening. They stay firm and seem to me that they would stand up to handling and shipping reasonably well. They also seemed to have a little thicker/firmer walls than most.

It you're growing for the great flavor of fresh picked and grow enough you have fresh coming in daily, they probably aren't for you. If you are growing to have something to sell that looks good, has decent shelf life and beats the pants off the taste of most tomatoes with good shelf life and would stand up to quite a bit of handling, I think they are definitely worth trying.

July 16, 2015	#1
naseer Tomatovillian™ Join Date: May 2011 Location: Poughkeepsie, NY Posts: 15	Garden Gem available! sort of... If you've followed any of the news about the research into tasty varieties coming out of University of Florida, you may already be familiar with the Garden Gem variety that Harry Klee developed. Produced through traditional cross-breeding techniques, it was optimized for both superb flavor and shippability, so you would think it would be poised to replace all the styrofoam-tasting tomatoes on the shelves in supermarkets worldwide. Unfortunately, the buyers at the stores and seed suppliers have responded tepidly, so the seeds aren't readily available. More details on that here: http://www.slate.com/articles/life/f...ors_picks=true HOWEVER, there is a silver lining. I looked on fb for Garden Gem, and found that they've set up an fb page just for this variety (https://www.facebook.com/pages/Garde...717213?fref=ts). There, they claim that if you donate to the University of Florida Tomato Research Fund--no suggested minimum--they'll send you seeds for Garden Gem and Garden Treasure (even newer variety). The link to the UF fundraising page is: https://www.uff.ufl.edu/OnlineGiving...undCode=011545 I gave $20 and thought there might be more people here who would be interested. Really looking forward to tasting this variety next summer!

July 21, 2015	#2
naseer Tomatovillian™ Join Date: May 2011 Location: Poughkeepsie, NY Posts: 15	More details. It turns out Garden Gem is semi-determinate and Garden Treasure is indeterminate. I think both are F1 Hybrid. So far almost 800 people have donated (the minimum is $10), and they've already sent out 500 packs of seeds--20 seeds of each variety per donation. It's too bad that in zone 5b I won't be able to plant mine until next year. Very interested to see how they do in our region.

August 6, 2015	#3
naseer Tomatovillian™ Join Date: May 2011 Location: Poughkeepsie, NY Posts: 15	My seeds arrived! The demand was so high that they temporarily ran out of Garden Treasure (their indeterminate hybrid), which is too bad. However, they did provide 4 packets of 20 seeds each: 2 packets are "new hybrid" with record levels of lycopene 1 packet of Garden Gem 1 packet of one of Garden Gem's parents--Maglia Rosa Cherry Did anyone end up getting any Garden Treasure?

August 6, 2015	#4
maf Tomatovillian™ Join Date: Jun 2010 Location: England Posts: 512	A few days ago I received Garden Gem and Garden Treasure, but I didn't get any new hybrids. I am pretty sure there was another thread here talking about these seeds and this offer.

August 6, 2015	#5
roper2008 Tomatovillian™ Join Date: Oct 2009 Location: Virginia Bch, VA (7b) Posts: 1,337	I received Garden Gem and "New" Hybrid tomato.

August 6, 2015	#6
Barb_FL Tomatovillian™ Join Date: Apr 2014 Location: Indialantic, Florida Posts: 2,000	Mine were delivered yesterday and it was Garden Gem and Garden Treasure. I am going to plant for the fall season; probably within the next week or so. What does it say about the "New Hybrid".

August 6, 2015	#7
kayrobbins Tomatovillian™ Join Date: Dec 2013 Location: Jacksonville, Fl Posts: 820	That is strange Barb since I got my seeds 2 weeks ago and they said they were out of Garden Treasure and substituted New Hybrid. I started 10 seeds of Garden Gem and 10 of New Hybrid as soon as I got them since I plant out fall tomatoes the first week in September. The New Hybrid only had 40% germination. The Garden Gem was 100% and those are already very robust plants that I just stepped them up to 4 inch pots.

August 7, 2015	#10
Barb_FL Tomatovillian™ Join Date: Apr 2014 Location: Indialantic, Florida Posts: 2,000	naseer - messaging you

August 15, 2015	#11
RJGlew Tomatovillian™ Join Date: Jul 2013 Location: Alberta, Canada Posts: 646	You may find the paper listed on UofFl/H.Klee's site about taste preferences an interesting read - the sampling data is pre-2012 so GG is not included in the cluster data. Tieman DM, McIntyre L, Blandon-Ubeda A, Bies D, Odabasi A, Rodriguez G, van der Knaap E, Taylor M, Goulet C, Mageroy MH, Snyder D, Colquoun T, Moskowitz H, Sims C, Clark D, Bartoshuk L, Klee H. 2012. The chemical interactions underlying tomato flavor preferences. Current Biology 22:1-5. http://www.hos.ufl.edu/kleeweb/paper...%20Biology.pdf rg

August 31, 2015	#12
kevenson Tomatovillian™ Join Date: May 2014 Location: Kalispell, MT Posts: 5	I got my garden gems 2 days ago and am anxious to give them a start next spring. If they are as good as the "hype", they should be something. I was disappointed that they ran our of the "treasures" but they sent substitute seeds-I'll give them a try. Now, if I could only get dem perch to bite.

September 3, 2015	#13
dfollett Tomatovillian™ Join Date: Dec 2012 Location: Utah Posts: 693	I donated, received and grew Garden Treasure, Garden Gem and "New Hybrid". I can't speak to germination (I always overseed and eliminate most). They were very hardy plants that stood up to foliage diseases better than most. They produced very uniform, good looking fruits - no cracking or cat-facing, which I get a lot of because of hot days and very cool nights. They had good flavor - not WOW flavor, but certainly much better than average. The biggest difference I saw was shelf life, which is one thing I think they were after. They do not go mushy quickly after ripening. They stay firm and seem to me that they would stand up to handling and shipping reasonably well. They also seemed to have a little thicker/firmer walls than most. It you're growing for the great flavor of fresh picked and grow enough you have fresh coming in daily, they probably aren't for you. If you are growing to have something to sell that looks good, has decent shelf life and beats the pants off the taste of most tomatoes with good shelf life and would stand up to quite a bit of handling, I think they are definitely worth trying.